Moger Increases Kings’ Chances

Arms went into the air and everybody looked up to watch the scoreboard change, the replay shown.

Sandy Moger just looked down.

Yep, skates where they were supposed to be. White ice under them, not blue.

His goal at 17:06 of the third period Sunday night gave the Kings a 3-2 win over Carolina before 5,569. It was Moger’s first this season, but it was hardly the first time he has visited the neighborhood around the net.

That neighborhood has been a problem for him.

“I don’t even think about it. I’ve just got to get to the net and be around it,” Moger insisted. “I don’t even think about the crease.”

Right, which is why he was at the right place at the right time to deflect in Mattias Norstrom’s shot from the blue line for the game-winner.

And why he was at the wrong place at the wrong time twice at Vancouver on Oct. 12, when goals were waved off because his skates were on the crease’s blue ice.

“I had just come out from behind the net and whacked at it,” Moger said of his Sunday shot. “I think I hit the goalie too.”

And then . . .

“I did look down to make sure,” he acknowledged, a bit sheepishly.

The view above was a bit different than usual for the Kings, who ended a three-game winless streak in which they were 0-1-2 and picked up a victory in the middle of a five-game trip that they started 0-1-1. It’s only the second time in the season’s seven games that they have scored more than two goals.

“It’s a big goal,” said Luc Robitaille, who scored for the fourth time, taking a pass from Ray Ferraro and putting the puck past Trevor Kidd at 9:22 of the second period to tie the score, 1-1.

“You can’t win if you only score one or two goals a game.”

You can. The Kings have won twice with two goals, but it’s a lot harder.

Glen Murray also scored from a stride inside the blue line to make the score 2-1, but Carolina had matched the Kings with goals from Robert Kron and Gary Roberts and it looked as if emergency goalie Manny Legace would continue to be denied his first NHL win until Moger deflected home Norstrom’s shot.

“That was especially nice to get that first win against the team that traded me,” said Legace, who toiled in the Hurricanes’--and their predecessors, the Hartford Whalers’--farm system for four seasons until being traded to the Kings in July.

“That always gives you a nice incentive.”

As if he needed one. Legace turned back 29 shots Sunday night, giving him 93 saves in 147 minutes 13 seconds since Wednesday.

He has given up four goals in two-plus games.

“How good is that little kid Manny, huh?” Robitaille said. “He’s really playing well. He played like that in camp. He just hasn’t given up any bad goals. It’s good for him. He’s given a chance for our two goalies [Stephane Fiset and Jamie Storr, both nursing groin injuries] to get well.”

The Kings have been struggling with scoring much of the season, save for their five-goal effort in a tie with Colorado, and one of the reasons has been turnovers at the blue line. They were held to a minimum Sunday night, in a game that pleased Coach Larry Robinson.

He hasn’t been pleased that often.

“I’m not so much concerned with how many goals we’re scoring, so much as the way we’re playing,” he said. “I think going into the last two, actually 2 1/2 periods of this game--and last game--I thought the effort was there. We just weren’t getting the effort before.

“At least tonight, we stuck to our game plan and did the little things we wanted to do, maybe with the exception of a few little things here and there.”

Largely the game plan was to get the puck into the offensive zone and chase it down, something they have failed to do until recently. That and get somebody close to the net, a la Moger.

“We’ve had our share of the bumps and bruises, but in our game, when we’re on our game, we’ve got guys coming out with little cuts on their heads and over their eyes and ice packs on,” Robinson said. “That means you’re involved. That means you’re where the action is. You can’t play on the perimeter these days and expect to have any success.”

Murray’s and Robitaille’s goals came from the perimeter, but the win came when Moger went to the net.

“I think he was a little snake-bit,” Robinson said, “and some of those calls were a little questionable. So it’s nice to see him get a big goal.”

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DUCKS, TIE STYLE

Teemu Selanne scored and set up Steve Rucchin’s tying goal as Anaheim rallied for a 2-2 tie with Phoenix. Page 4